Monthly statistics of the money stock have been published regularly for some time, but hitherto there have been no comparable regular statistical tables bringing together other liquid assets. Any definition of liquidity is inevitably arbitrary and will depend to some extent on the particular purpose for which the information is required. Whatever concept may be theoretically desirable, there are in any event deficiencies in the statistics that are likely to prevent it being measured precisely. It may nevertheless be helpful to assemble, as consistently as possible, those components for which monthly statistics are available or can be estimated, not to provide a unique liquidity aggregate but rather a spectrum of what are generally regarded as liquid assets.
Components of private sector liquidity